Fedora Core 4 is out: "Ladies and Gentlemen, you may have *thought* you were using the latest and greatest in open source software, but folks, today we have something really, really exciting for you. It purrs. It hums. It mesmerizes. It is ... FEDORA CORE FOUR. That's right, the premier open source operating system has just turned 4 -- four releases that is! But before we tell you how much this is going to cost, here are a few of the fabulous features: GNOME 2.10, OpenOffice.org 2.0 prerelease, Eclipse and a 100% open source Java stack, Fedora Extras, KDE 3.4, PPC. All of that, yes, all of that. But, wait!, before you reach for your wallet, you should hear about a few more of Fedora Core 4's fabulous features...." Here is the full release announcement and, for the more serious types, also the release notes. The ISO images can be obtained via BitTorrent or from a number of download mirrors; here are some quick links to the DVD ISO images for the three architectures: FC4-i386-DVD.iso (2,623MB, SHA1), FC4-ppc-DVD.iso (2,948MB, SHA1), FC4-x86_64-DVD.iso (2,797MB, SHA1).

Fedora (formerly Fedora Core) is a Linux distribution developed by the community-supported Fedora Project and owned by Red Hat. Fedora contains software distributed under a free and open-source license and aims to be on the leading edge of such technologies. Fedora has a reputation for focusing on innovation, integrating new technologies early on and working closely with upstream Linux communities. The default desktop in Fedora is the GNOME desktop environment and the default interface is the GNOME Shell. Other desktop environments, including KDE, Xfce, LXDE, MATE and Cinnamon, are available. Fedora Project also distributes custom variations of Fedora called Fedora spins. These are built with specific sets of software packages, offering alternative desktop environments or targeting specific interests such as gaming, security, design, scientific computing and robotics.

The Fedora project has announced the launch of Fedora 25. The new version of the Red Hat sponsored community project features version 3.22 of the GNOME desktop environment, a new media writer to make it easier to download and copy the distribution to a USB stick, improved Flatpak support and MP3 playback is now included in the project's official software repositories. "This release includes a plugin for MP3 decoding such as playing music. If you play a MP3 file from your collection, GNOME Software detects it and helps you install the plugin. For developers, Fedora 25 Workstation introduces improved Flatpak support. These enhancements now make it easier to install, update and remove Flatpak software. The improvements make this application packaging standard more user friendly." Additional information can be found in the release announcement. Fedora 25 is available in Workstation, Server and Cloud editions as well as many community spins featuring alternative software and desktop environments. Download (pkglist): Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-25-1.3.iso (1,374MB, SHA256, torrent), Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-25-1.3.iso (1,925MB, SHA256, torrent).

The Fedora Project has announced the release of a new development snapshot of the Red Hat-sponsored community distribution: Fedora 25 beta. The beta release features version 3.22 of the GNOME desktop environment, support for the Rust programming language and a media writer which helps users download and transfer installation images to a USB thumb drive. The new beta ships with Wayland as the default display server with X available as a fallback option. "Wayland is the replacement for the legacy X11 display system. Wayland has been under development for several years. While like most software it still has some bugs, we believe it’s ready to serve as a default that works for many users. Users can still select the old X11 system if necessary to avoid a problem that affects them. Improved Flatpak support in the Software tool: The Software tool has the ability to install, update, and remove Flatpak software where a Fedora system is configured to point to a repo that offers it." Additional information can be found in the release announcement. Download (pkglist): Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-25_Beta-1.1.iso (1,373MB, SHA256, torrent), Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-25_Beta-1.1.iso (1,948MB, SHA256, torrent).

Dennis Gilmore has announced that the initial alpha build of the upcoming Fedora 25 release is ready for download and testing. "The Fedora project is pleased to announce the immediate availability of the Fedora 25 alpha, an important milestone on the road to our Fedora 25 release in November." With the release announcement unusually void any meaningful details about the release and a complete absence of any release notes, the best document describing Fedora 25 is this Releases/25/ChangeSet page on the Fedora wiki. On the technical side, this alpha release of Fedora 25 comes with a recent development build of the Linux kernel (4.8-rc2) while the Workstation edition runs the GNOME-Shell 3.21.3 desktop, which is also a development build. Images for Power64 and 64-bit ARM (AArch64) architectures are also provided. Download links: Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-25_Alpha-2.iso (1,372MB, SHA256, torrent, pkglist), Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-25_Alpha-1.2.iso (1,774MB, SHA256, torrent).

The Fedora Project has announced the launch of Fedora 24. The new version of Fedora ships with GNOME 3.20 and the Fedora graphical package manager supports working with Flatpak packages. Though Fedora still uses X as the default display server, Wayland is available as an alternative display technology. "The Fedora 24 Workstation release features GNOME 3.20, with many usability improvements such as easier input device and printer settings, a better search interface, shortcut windows for keyboard commands, and more convenient music controls. Flatpak (formerly xdg-app) is another building-block feature, with Software able to track installed Flatpaks and adding more features in the future as the technology develops. The Software app has also grown features to provide a full system upgrade directly from the desktop from one Fedora release to the next, and the ability to provide labelling as well as reviews of available software. Fedora 24 continues our work on the X replacement, Wayland, a next-generation graphics stack." Further details can be found in the release announcement. Fedora is available in Workstation, Server and Cloud editions. Download (pkglist): Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-24-1.2.iso (1,470MB, SHA256, torrent), Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-24-1.2.iso (1,782MB, SHA256, torrent).

The Fedora team has announced the availability of a new development release of their Red Hat sponsored community distribution. The new version, Fedora 24 Beta, provides users with packages built with version 6 of GNU's Compiler Collection. The new testing release also features GNOME 3.20 and an optional Wayland desktop session. "Under the hood, glibc has moved to 2.23. The update includes better performance, many bug fixes and improvements to POSIX compliance, and additional locales. The new library is backwards compatible with the version of glibc that was shipped in Fedora 23, and includes a number of security and bug fixes. We've also updated the system compiler to GCC 6 and rebuilt all packages with that, providing greater code optimization and catching programming errors which had slipped past previous compilers." Additional information can be found in the project's release announcement. Download: Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-24_Beta-1.6.iso (1,393MB, SHA256, torrent, pkglist).

The Fedora Project has launched the first alpha snapshot of the distribution's upcoming Fedora 24 release. The new testing snapshot features version 6 of the GNU Compiler Collection and a preview of GNOME 3.20. Wayland is available as a session option, but X remains the default display server. "Workstation features a preview of GNOME 3.20, which was released just after the Alpha was cut. The GNOME 3.20 release is already available in the Fedora 24 update stream. Once you install Fedora 24 Alpha, you can use Software or DNF to update. GNOME 3.20 will of course be part of Fedora 24 Beta and the Final release. We have decided not to make Wayland, the next generation graphic stack, the default in Fedora 24 Workstation. However, Wayland remains available as an option, and the Workstation team would greatly appreciate your help in testing. Our goal is one full release where the non-default Wayland option works seamlessly, or reasonably close thereto. At that point we will make Wayland the default with X11 as the fallback option." Additional information on Fedora 24 Alpha along with the project's Workstation, Server, Cloud, ARM and other spins can be found in the release announcement and release notes. Download (pkglist): Fedora-Workstation-Live-x86_64-24_Alpha-7.iso (1,403MB, SHA256, torrent), Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-24_Alpha-1.7.iso (1,879MB, SHA256, torrent).

The Fedora team has launched a new version of their Red Hat sponsored Linux distribution. The new release, Fedora 23, is available in multiple editions, including Workstation, Server and Cloud as well as multiple community spins. The latest version of Fedora ships with version 3.18 of the GNOME desktop, LibreOffice 5 and version 4.2 of the Linux kernel. This release sees core utilities, such as the system installer and package manager, ported to Python 3. In addition, software packages have been hardened with memory address randomization built in. "As with every Fedora release, almost every component has a new version, with improvements across the board. Of particular note, Fedora Workstation includes the GNOME 3.18 desktop environment and the LibreOffice 5.0 office suite. Fedora 23 also has important under-the-hood security improvements, with increased hardening for all compiled software and with insecure SSL3 and RC4 protocols disabled. We've also updated all of the software installed by default in Fedora Cloud Base Image and Fedora Workstation to use Python version 3, and the Mono .NET compatible framework is now at version 4. Perhaps most importantly, Unicode 8.0 support now enables the crucial U1F32D character." Additional information can be found in the release announcement and in the detailed release notes. Download (torrents): Fedora-Live-Workstation-x86_64-23-10.iso (1,401MB, SHA256, torrent, pkglist), Fedora-Server-DVD-x86_64-23.iso (2,050MB, SHA256, torrent).

Dennis Gilmore has announced the release of Fedora 23 Beta. This new test release showcases a number of important changes to the Red Hat sponsored distribution. Fedora's new beta release features security hardened packages to protect against memory corruption, GNOME 3.18 is included in the project's Workstation edition and support for security protocols known to be vulnerable (such as SSL3 and RC4) have been removed from the distribution. "Fedora 23 includes a number of changes that will improve all of the
editions. For example, Fedora 23 makes use of compiler flags to improve security by `hardening' the binaries against memory corruption vulnerabilities, buffer overflows, and so on. This is a 'behind the scenes' change that most users won't notice through normal use of a Fedora edition, but will help provide additional system security." The new beta release also includes support for Unicode 8.0. Further details on Fedora Server, Workstation and Cloud editions (as well as community spins) can be found in the release announcement. Download (pkglist): Fedora-Live-Workstation-x86_64-23_Beta-1.iso (1,401MB, SHA256, torrent), Fedora-Server-DVD-x86_64-23_Beta.iso (2,107MB, SHA256, torrent).

Dennis Gilmore has announced the availability of a new development release of Fedora. The new release, Fedora 23 Alpha, is the first testing snapshot of the Fedora 23 series. The new testing release features packages built with extra protection against memory corruption. Fedora 23 Alpha also offers support for Unicode 8.0, a preview of GNOME 3.18 and LibreOffice 5.0. "Naturally, GNOME is getting an upgrade, with Fedora 23 containing a
preview of the upcoming GNOME 3.18 release, which is easier to use than ever. There are also many enhancements on the way, such as improvements to Wayland toward making it the default graphical server in a future release; support for ambient backlight drivers for a more responsive display on laptops; and changes to the Software application so it can update system firmware, and be smarter about metered Internet connections. Users that are trying to get a little work done on Fedora will be happy to see LibreOffice 5 in Fedora 23, which includes a lot of new features and improvements: style previews in the sidebar, Word-compatible text highlighting, built-in image crop, UI for data bars in Calc, support for Time-Stamp Protocol in PDF export, support for Adobe Swatch Exchange color palettes, import of Apple Pages files, improved support for HiDPI screens, and significantly improved support for MS Office formats." More information is available in the release announcement. Along with the standard Workstation, Server and Cloud editions, Fedora 23 alpha is available in several spins. Download: Fedora-Live-Workstation-x86_64-23_Alpha-2.iso (1,430MB, SHA256, torrent, pkglist), Fedora-Server-DVD-x86_64-23_Alpha.iso (2,104MB, SHA256, torrent).

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